Minister Nguyen Hong Dien has just had a working session with Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Republic of the Philippines to Vietnam Meynardo Los Banos Montealegre.

Minister Nguyen Hong Dien highly appreciated the achievements of the two countries after 45 years of establishing diplomatic relations, especially in economic and trade cooperation.

Vietnam and the Philippines have become strategic partners since 2015 and are now important trade and investment partners of each other in the region and around the world. Bilateral trade turnover between Vietnam and the Philippines has nearly doubled, from USD 2.4 billion in 2010 to USD 5.3 billion in 2020.

In particular, under the influence of the Covid-19 pandemic, the two-way import and export turnover almost did not decline in 2020 and regained a strong growth rate in the first five months of 2021.

In order for the two countries to more effectively exploit the advantages and at the same time solve the disadvantages to promote bilateral trade, Minister Nguyen Hong Dien emphasized that the two countries need to focus on opening the market for each other's strong agricultural products.

At the same time, he asked the Philippines to remove barriers and unfavorable regulations for Vietnam's export products such as cement, plywood, ceramic tiles, etc.

Regarding rice trade cooperation between the two countries, the Minister said that Vietnam is committed to being a stable and quality rice supplier to the Philippines and suggested that the Philippines give Vietnam preferential treatment when the Philippines has import demand. In 2020, Vietnam exported over 6 million tons of rice, bringing in USD 3.1 billion, of which the Philippines is the largest rice import market from Vietnam.

According to data from the General Department of Customs, for many years in a row, the Philippines ranked first in Vietnam's rice consumption, but last year was the first year that the Philippines' import value of Vietnamese rice exceeded USD 1 billion, reaching 2.22 million tons, increased by 4% in volume, increased by 19.3% in turnover compared to 2019.

Besides the volume of rice exported to the Philippines with such a large volume as above, the high export price to this market in the past year is also an important reason to help the rice export turnover to the Philippines reach the milestone of over USD 1 billion. In 2020, the price of rice exported to the Philippines reached an average of USD 476 /ton, an increase of 14.7% compared to 2019.

The Philippines continues to be the largest market, accounting for 35.5% of the total volume and 33.9% of the country's total rice exports.

Kylie Nguyen